Verified Document

Fire Department Manages Emergencies Like Term Paper

But RIT operations have only been institutionalized in the fire service during the last few decades. As McGrail writes in his book Firefighter Operations in High-Rise and Standpipe-Equipped Buildings McGrail (2007, p. 59): During the decade of the '90s, and into the beginning of the 21st century, the whole concept of rapid intervention was developed and has evolved into what it is today. From a time when even the term RIT was foreign to most fire departments, to today when RIT is not only common term to most, it is now the topic of countless articles...most fire departments operate with some form of RIT in a standby position at all fireground operations.

Although RIT has become standard in the fire service, during the 9-11 and Katrina disasters, it was found that either there were not enough RIT teams or none at all in some fire departments in Louisiana. For the RIT teams that were deployed, their training could not have prepared ten for with of these two events. The 9-11 attacks for example, when the firefighters arrived on scene, they did not have the capabilities to reach the floors that were on fire due to the height. In addition, rescuing people became difficult not only because there were a lot of them trapped in the higher floors and there was no way to reach them. Thos firefighters who were able to enter the buildings had to contend with falling debris, smoke, panicking people and even toxic materials and fumes.

During Hurricane Katrina, the fire service's major role of firefighting took to the sidelines because majority of the tasks involved search, rescue, retrieval and evacuation of trapped people. The event also proved tremendously difficult because there were not enough firefighters to serve the numerous victims of Hurricane Katrina. A new reality was also faced by the fire service during Hurricane Katrina and this was more on the personal aspects of the firefighters involved. Since those who responded during Hurricane Katrina, particularly those belonging to the different fire departments in Louisiana, were residents of the state or cities/municipalities struck by the disaster, these firefighters have families that were victims also. Thus, there have been reports that some firefighters left their duties in order to attend to their families needed rescuing. This did not happen though immediately but occurred one some of the firefighters realized that they are facing an impossible situation and the next prudent thing to do was to ensure the safety of their families.

Aside from having to face impossible situations and lack of available personnel to manage events of the magnitude that the 9-11 and Hurricane Katrina events demonstrated, other major problems faced by the fire service in dealing with these two disasters included "flawed policies, [lack of] leadership, and organization at both the national and local levels of government (Weitz, 2005). These findings were clearly documented in both the House and the Senate during the hearings done after the two events. Details of the outcome of the hearings are discussed in the succeeding section.

D. Findings of the House and the Senate on the 9-11 and Hurricane Katrina

During the House and Senate hearings held after the 9-11 and Hurricane Katrina events, findings pointed out to several things that went wrong. One glaring finding regarding both events is the lack of communications amongst the responding agencies. For instance, on the morning of September 11, New York police officers were able to hear the radio warnings from helicopters that the North Tower of the World Trade Center was glowing red and most of the police officers exited the building safely, while dozens of firefighters who could not hear those same warnings, tragically perished when the tower collapsed (U.S. House of Representatives, 2005). In the Senate, communications figured also as an area lacking during Hurricane Katrina. More particularly, the findings were, "Destruction of communications towers and equipment in particular limited the ability of crews to communicate with one another, undermining coordination and efficiency. Rescuers also had to contend with weapons fire, debris, and polluted water. (Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, 2006)" Consequently, both cases showed that the fie service will have to revisit their communications system and how this can be integrated with other agencies in order for the problems faced during the 9-11 and Hurricane Katrina events will not happen again. Without an integrated communication system, the fire service cannot properly manage disasters along the lines of these two events.

Although communications have been the general...

There are subtle differences through and Donald Moynihan provided two different outcomes of how communications were used during the two events. For the 9-11 terrorist attacks, Moynihan states (2007), "The response to this event has been described as a success by the 9/11 Commission, which recommended the widespread use of the Incident Command System." In the case of Hurricane Katrina, "The response to Katrina featured neither an effective network nor an effective hierarchy. It lacked a clear command and positive working relationships among key actors (Moynihan, 2007)." Consequently it is clear that the latter have provided enough communications support on the strategic level to ensure that emergency services would have deployed properly. Nonetheless, there was still a problem with communications though at the ground level because the various emergency response services have no unified communications systems on the ground. The same goes through with Katrina but it was more disastrous because of the lack of strategic coordinating efforts. What happened then in both cases is that the fire departments involved had to act on their own and often had conflicts with other services due to the lack of unified communications. The reason for this state of affairs is that public safety agencies traditionally have made individualized decisions about information and communications technology, generally failing to purchase state-of-the-art technology that operates effectively and interoperates with others involved in emergency response (Weiser, 2007, p. 548).
With the problems of communications faced by the fire departments, what they did was respond to calls from various entities and deploy personnel as needed or based on triage. Often it became a first-come-first-served matter until the fire department personnel reached its limit or there was already a lack of personnel to be deployed in problem areas. Specifically, "Hurricane Katrina was the largest natural disaster in the United States in living memory, affecting 92,000 square miles and destroying much of a major city (Moynihan, 2010);" with these figures in mind, imagine the area of responsibility the fire departments and the gravity of the situation they had to faced. Unlike the 9-11 terrorist incidents whereby the area of deployment was confined and static, for Katrina, it is everywhere and anywhere. Thus, fire departments in the area had no way of truly providing the response needed to those that faced the disaster. Indeed, from the various reports of the two Houses of Congress, it is clear that fire departments should have additional support when faced with similar or worst disasters like the 9-11 and Katrina events. As recommended during the House hearings, "To best equip our Nation's first responders to do their job, they must be able to communicate with one another, not just between fire, police, EMS in one jurisdiction, but also on the local, State, and Federal jurisdictions (U.S. House of Representatives, 2005)."

E. Lessons Learned and Implementation of the Plan Thereafter

The lessons of the 9-11 and Katrina disasters are clear, no fire department at present can manage such disasters of those magnitudes without establishing major paradigm shifts in the make-up of the contemporary fire service. One of the changes that has to be made in order for the fire departments to handle future events such these two is to look at the fire service as a service that not only operates on land but may have operational requirements also in the air and water. In the case of the New Orleans Fire Department, one of the Senate findings stated (Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, 2006):

The Office of Emergency Preparedness for New Orleans, long known to be among the nation's cities most vulnerable to a catastrophic hurricane, had a staff of only three. Its police and fire departments, responsible for search and rescue activities, had five and no boats, respectively. In 2004, the city turned down a request by the New Orleans Fire Department to fund the purchase of six additional boats.

It may be perplexing to note how the city of New Orleans never thought about the importance for the New Orleans Fire Department to have their own boats especially since the city has various waterways traversing and surrounding it. Had the city provided the boats to the New Orleans Fire Department, they would have been able to save more lives and do more when Hurricane Katrina struck.

The above is but one example of the change that needs to be done to the fire service in terms of redefining the area or operations. The boats are part of the needed changes…

Sources used in this document:
Bibliography:

Kirby, M. & Lakamp, T. (2010, August 1). "Challenges of the modern fireground." Firefighter Nation. Retrieved July 18, 2011 from http://dev2000.firefighternation.com/article/firefighting-operations/challenges-modern-fireground

Lasky, R. (2006). Pride and ownership: A firefighter's love of the job. Tulsa, OK: PennWell Corporation.

McGrail, D.M. (2007). Firefighter operations in high-rise and standpipe-equipped buildings. Tulsa, OK: PennWell Corporation.

Moynihan, D.P. (2007, June 11). "From forest fires to Hurricane Katrina: Case studies of incident command systems." IBM Center for The Business of Government -- Networks and Partnerships Series. Retrieved July 18, 2011 from http://www.rrt9.org/external/content/document/2763/716399/1/ICS%20from%20forest%20fires%20to%20Katrina%20-%20Moynihan.pdf
Moynihan, D.P. (2010, May 10). "The response to Hurricane Katrina." IRGC Report on Risk Governance Deficits: An Analysis and Illustration of the Most Common Deficits in Risk Governance. Retrieved July 18, 2011 from http://www.irgc.org/IMG/pdf/Hurricane_Katrina_full_case_study_web.pdf
Nickerson, B.J. & Straub, F.G. (Eds.). (2006, May 26). "Building sound homeland security foundations: Enhancing local police-fire cooperation." An Executive Summit of Emergency Service Professionals: The Foundation for Emergency Preparedness, Police Executive Research Forum (PERF), The Michaelian Institute for Public Policy and Management, and Pace University. Retrieved July 18, 2011 from http://www.pace.edu/emplibrary/emergencysummitproceed053106.pdf
Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. (2006, May). Hurricane Katrina: A nation still unprepared: Executive summary. Retrieved July 18, 2011 from http://www.disastersrus.org/katrina/senatereport/ExecSum.pdf
Trappler, B. (2011, March 30). New York firefighters -- A sample of first-responders 10 years following the collapse of the World Trade Center. Retrieved July 18, 2011 from http://www.briantrappler.com/article_detail.cfm?ArticleID=143
Weitz, R. (2005, November 21). "FEMA, DHS, and Katrina: Managing domestic catastrophes better." Paper presented at a panel on Homeland Security: Coping with Natural and Man-Made Disasters at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies. Retrieved July 18, 2011 from http://www.hudson.org/files/publications/FEMA_Weitz_15feb06.pdf
U.S. House of Representatives. (2005, September 29). "Public safety communications from 9/11 to Katrina: Critical public policy lessons." Hearing before the Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, Serial No. 109 -- 52. Retrieved July 18, 2011 from http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/house/pdf/109hrg/24252.pdf
Weiser, P.J. (2007, May 10). "Communicating during emergencies: Toward interoperability and effective information management." Federal Communications Law Journal, 59(3): 547-574. Retrieved July 18, 2011 from http://www.law.indiana.edu/fclj/pubs/v59/no3/10-Weiser.pdf
Cite this Document:
Copy Bibliography Citation

Related Documents

Fire Department
Words: 2442 Length: 6 Document Type: Research Proposal

Fire Department Reviewing and changing standard fire fighting procedures for high rise buildings incidents The main aim of this research paper is to not only review the current standards for fighting fire in high rise buildings but to also recommend various ways to improve those standards. Furthermore, the paper also reviews how these standards may affect the current fire fighting methods. The needs of the local Chief Fire Officers, the current fire

How Public Perception Shape the Performance of the Fire Department...
Words: 1628 Length: 5 Document Type: Term Paper

Abstract Emergency personnel occupying the fire and emergency services make day-to-day decisions and their behavior contributes to the constant evolving of public perceptions. The negative perception of the public due to their scrutiny of fire and emergency operations, budgets, and behavior has slowly tarnished the image of these departments. Therefore, measures should be undertaken in saving the image of the fire and emergency services field through talking openly, reflecting on honesty,

Emergency Management Evaluate the Cims Program As
Words: 2015 Length: 5 Document Type: Term Paper

Emergency Management Evaluate the CIMS program as a means for implementing the NIMS It was on May 14, 2004 when Major Bloomberg and the Office of the Emergency Management -- OEM came with the declaration of the City's introduction of the Citywide Incident Management System -- CIMS as the City's proposal for dealing with emergency recovery plans and also for managing the planned events. From that time onwards, the City's first responder

Emergency Management When Emergency Strikes,
Words: 1618 Length: 5 Document Type: Term Paper

Recovery, remediation, and reconstruction finish the process of emergency response and if done properly it helps the society and people to get back to normalcy. Remediation and recovery are normally treated as operating budgets while reconstruction budgets are just about always are 100% capital in nature. The budgetary and other responses to any disaster or emergencies should be the best effort by any government as it involves the welfare

Emergency Planning and Operations Methodology
Words: 1276 Length: 5 Document Type: Term Paper

Emergency, Planning and Operations Methodology The Department of Homeland Security is fully aware of the importance of local and state first responders. Currently managed under the Department of Justice, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency and other various offices, local firefighters, state and local law enforcement, and local emergency medical personnel would be subject to the Department of Homeland Security's authority (http://www.whitehouse.gov/deptofhomeland/sect4.html).Moreover, the Department

Fire Safety Management
Words: 3977 Length: 14 Document Type: Term Paper

fire safety management. The writer explores several areas of fire safety and proposes several ways to manage its implementation. There were six sources used to complete this paper. Throughout history fires have destroyed property and killed people. Because a fire can happen anywhere at anytime the world has experienced fires in almost every setting and capacity. Fires in major hotels, high rise buildings and single dwelling homes are all things

Sign Up for Unlimited Study Help

Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.

Get Started Now